Many organizations are obsessed with volume – measuring success by how many web pages were viewed or how many people visited the site. In many cases, this type of information is meaningless as it is not directly linked to a web plan or strategy.
Whether its web site traffic analysis, search engine optimization or tracking business success metrics, you need to develop a web strategy ‘up front’ to support measurement objectives. This thought process seems so fundamental but rarely exercised.
Why? A strategic plan for evaluating your website will help you:
- Collect only the data you need to make informed, strategic decisions
- Identify priority “action areas” for improvement, measure the impact of those actions; and keep your customers coming back
- Determine benchmarks and performance goals you should aspire to, and the extent to which you’re achieving them
- Determine whether you’re getting a return on the investment you’ve made to build, operate and maintain your web site(s)
- Evaluate how well your web site is performing relative to competitors, your company's brand, mission statement or hiring criteria
How? Develop a plan – a strategy – and review and adjust it regularly by asking these questions:
- What do you need to measure?
- What are your requirements?
- How will you measure it?
- What tools will you use?
- What methodologies are needed to gather the data you need?
- What will you do with the results?
- How will the results help meet the goals for your web site and your company's mission?
- How does the plan fit with your company's overall strategic and performance plan?
Once armed with this process and validation, you will find that your ROI exceeds expectations!
Great Resources:
Coremetrics Web Metrics
Get powerful web site metrics with the leading provider
Web Measurement Data Fast
ClickTracks web measurement shows behavior, conversion, groups, SEO
WebTrends Analytics
Marketing Intelligence Solutions, leading analytic & metrics software
Web Analytics
Compare web analytics products and get a free report sample from CMS Watch
Best,
Denice MacDonald
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